Report detail

Police Scotland has now completed preparations for the upcoming Best Value review, including the production of a full self-assessment package and associated evidence, structured around the eight best value themes.

Police Scotland has followed the Public Service Improvement Framework in the best value preparations. Supported by the Improvement Service, we have adapted their framework statements to develop our Police Scotland self-assessment survey. This survey was completed by almost 100 of our Senior Leaders (Superintendent and above) at our Senior Leaders’ Event in January and by the Chief Officers on the same day. The survey results were then correlated with our Your Voice Matters survey results, to contribute to our overall self-assessment against the eight Best Value themes.

The Best Value team has created a framework for gathering and assessing evidence against the areas of investigation highlighted in the joint Audit Scotland and HMICS letter from September 2024, which notified us of their intention to conduct a Best Value joint audit (see appendix).

Each theme lead has been required to complete a self-assessment against each statement and produce an evidence base to support their assessment.

To support theme leads, the Best Value team facilitated eight workshops, one for each theme, supported by Audit, Assurance and Risk colleagues. This approach allowed Audit, Assurance and Risk to share best practice from their experience and provide their perspectives on each theme. These workshops were followed by a series of eight development workshops, where progress was discussed and direction confirmed.

Each theme lead has then been required to present their assessment and evidence base, to the force executive via a series of rigorous scrutiny sessions. The purpose of these sessions has been to agree an overall self-assessment and in doing so, identify any gaps. These sessions were extremely valuable and allowed the Chief Constable and the Executive team, to provide their input to each of the theme assessments.

These scrutiny sessions were followed by several detailed reviews of the consolidated assessment document, by the Chief Constable and deputies.

To date, over 500 pieces of evidence have been submitted to the Best Value team in support of our self-assessment, demonstrating the scale and complexity of our organisation. Examples include the final report on our Vision 2030 development, the three-year business plan (2024-27), our Competency and Values Framework (CVF), the COSLA, SPA and Police Scotland Partnership Agreement 2023 and the Police Scotland Corporate Governance Framework, to name just five. The Best Value team have reviewed this evidence bank, removed duplication, streamlined it and catalogued the evidence to the self-assessment documents prior to submission to the auditing bodies.

The process to date has highlighted the historical key best value successes against the Outline Business Case for Police reform. It has demonstrated a culture of continuous improvement that has allowed Police Scotland to evolve and remain agile to ensure we maintain a strong policing service in Scotland. It has demonstrated we have a strong and well-recognised 2030 Vision which has set the strategic direction for our Revised Model of Policing.

The self-assessment process has also confirmed areas where we need to continue our improvement journey, to ensure best value is delivered for the people of Scotland.

Beyond the preparations for the upcoming review, we continue to develop how we further embed the best value self-assessment approach as part of our Vision 2030 and business planning process. We also want to ensure that the best value assessments complement the ongoing work on continuous improvement. across Police Scotland.